


The Making of Saints

by Margo_Kim



Category: The Exorcist (TV)
Genre: Gay Male Character, I'm not sure how many times marcus has been kissed but i'm going with 'not a lot!', Kat Rance - Freeform, M/M, POV Marcus, Religious Content, Verity (The Exorcist) - Freeform, episode interlude
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-12-05
Updated: 2017-12-05
Packaged: 2019-02-10 19:31:36
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12918735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Margo_Kim/pseuds/Margo_Kim
Summary: Because there's evil in this house, because Tomas beside him picks at his salad with a hand that shakes the fork, because Andy who loves his children will not stop fingering the knife when he looks at the priest collar and asks Tomas if he thinks there's a demon in his daughter, Marcus does not say, "Do you know what I did last night? I kissed a man. He wanted to show me condors and I asked him to chase ghosts instead, and he turned the boat off halfway across the water when we returned. And he kissed me. And I kissed him. And I was scared, so scared I didn't think my legs would keep holding me up. I don't know if I was scared of kissing or scared of stopping. But I know there's no demon in me."





	The Making of Saints

Because there's evil in this house, because Tomas beside him picks at his salad with a hand that shakes the fork, because Andy who loves his children will not stop fingering the knife when he looks at the priest collar and asks Tomas if he thinks there's a demon in his daughter, Marcus does not say, "Do you know what I did last night? I kissed a man. He wanted to show me condors and I asked him to chase ghosts instead, and he turned the boat off halfway across the water when we returned. And he kissed me. And I kissed him. And I was scared, so scared I didn't think my legs would keep holding me up. I don't know if I was scared of kissing or scared of stopping. But I know there's no demon in me."

Tomas apologizes to Verity. Andy's eyes are too black, too wet. Doll's eyes, fresh painted. Marcus knows that look. Andy's porcelain, set to crack the second he tips over. Houseful of innocents set to get cut on the shards, Andy included. Marcus knows this, the stakes, he's eating dinner with the consequences of what could go wrong, so that's why the conversation jolts and lurches forward, and Marcus does not lean over the table to Verity, who is looking at Tomas like no man wreathed in righteousness has ever apologized before and she can neither accept nor reject it, and Marcus does not say, "Six months ago in Chicago, Tomas exorcised a demon from a woman I would have considered lost and damned, and her oldest daughter like girls. Like a girl, liked all girls, something like that, I'm sure you know what I'm talking about, she had that halo of deviance in the most neutral sense of the word. You get good at spotting it, don't you? Outliers finding outliers. Everyone hiding something hides it the same damn way. Kat. Her name was Kat, you'd be surprised how much you'd like her. You wouldn’t think you would, punk girl—Kat's a blonde ballerina who never met a pastel she didn't love. But she's like you. Tough as hell. Tougher. Smashed her own knee so her sister wouldn't have to. Called the cops on me. Can’t fault her there. She loves her sister the way you love your family, the one the doll eyed man at the head of the table cobbled together with his dead wife and his troubled wards. I've got her cell phone number. Kat’s. She'll tell you all about demons. One hijacked her sister's mouth to sneer something about 'lesbo whatever'. It wouldn't work on her these days. Demons can only use what you're ashamed of."

Marcus eats his salad instead. Been a while since they got a home cooked meal. Shame about the circumstances. When this is over, he’ll find Verity. Say something like all that, though a little more edited, a little less drunk on what he’s sure everyone else in the world would consider chaste kisses. Say something to her about God, how she is a perfect child of God, cherished and exalted for exactly who she is. He’ll tell her the thing about demons and shame. Evil things in this world work hard to hand you shame. You do your best not to carry it.

Outside the house, on the other side of a failed attempt to rattle a demon from the gaunt foster father who welcomed a half dozen cuckoos to his nest, Tomas bends his head in grateful supplication to Marcus’ offer of mutual prayer. There’s a relief in the way he drops his head. He barely holds it up these days. Too heavy by half; he uses the collar like a brace to keep his neck from snapping. Marcus clasps his hands in front of him, lowers his head, raises his eyes. Watches Tomas pray. Tomas’ lips flutter prayers to the Mother in his mother tongue.

He’s a beautiful man, beautiful as exquisite marble in the days when the Church beautified the Western world and illiterate mass found their understanding of salvation in the reliefs and colored glass. He’s all the more beautiful for being so tired, so sad, skin stretched too thin over the bones of his holy frame—Catholics have a thing for eroticism of suffering, the sufferance of eroticism provided one lusts for God. Picture Sebastian, alabaster skin pierced by bloodless arrow, twisting with something that might be pain or some other sensation that makes the eyes roll back. Picture Theresa, shuddering with the most holy divine ecstasy, the orgasm of the soul, head tilted back in silent eternal scream.

Tomas invites his own destruction in the name of the possessed, those most vulnerable of bodies and souls. He treats his body like it’s merely a reliquary for his someday sainted heart.

Because of all this, because the situation in the house is unchanged except in how it has gotten worse, Marcus does not say, “Do you know where I was last night? Did you think I was pacing the floors from sunset to sunrise waiting for you? I was, Tomas. That was the latter half of my evening, tormenting myself over what new misery and pain you had found to wade into without me there. That was my night and morning. Yes. But I also kissed a man, he kissed me and I kissed him, and I felt him on my lips all night even as I used them to curse you. He asked me what I saw in the stillness, and I fished out my ugliness. I met him examining with tender care a rotten fish washed up and dead where it didn’t belong. Seeing that, I should have known he would kiss me. I wish I had kissed him longer. All night I wished for his presence as I raged at your absence, the two passions as entwined as our fingers in prayer.”

Marcus does not say this aloud. He offers the words to God instead and calls it a prayer. In the space where response might be, the sweetest silence, like one might find in the heart of the deepest forest or the center of the ocean. Marcus assumes, at least. He’s not had the chance to explore many forests or oceans. If demons want to skulk that far from people, Marcus won’t clomp after them. Still. Might be nice to be more outdoorsy. Might find God again in a tree. Might ask Peter to show him those condors.  


End file.
